Vicenza is the most popular leather available for the Freedom Chair. Vicenza has a smaller, less pronounced grain pattern than Acqua or Cervo leathers and is frequently used on fine Italian furniture as well.

Cervo leather has a rich color and supple pebble grain texture that just feels silky and smooth despite being pebbly. "Cervo" means "deer" in Italian, and the Cervo leather is treated to approximate the supple quality of deer hide.

Both the above leathers are made by Spinneybeck and are Greenguard Certified.

Vicenza is the most popular leather available for the Freedom Chair. Vicenza has a smaller, less pronounced grain pattern than Acqua or Cervo leathers and is frequently used on fine Italian furniture as well.

Cervo leather has a rich color and supple pebble grain texture that just feels great. If this chair is going in your home, we recommend you sit in it mostly naked when possible to maximize contact with the leather. "Cervo" means "deer" in Italian, and the Cervo leather is treated to approximate the supple quality of deer hide.

All the above leathers are made by Spinneybeck and are Greenguard Certified.

Base and Frame:The graphite and titanium base and frame are made of hard plastic with your choice of finish. The polished aluminum base is available with either a graphite or titanium finished hard plastic frame.

What is matching upholstery on the armrests? Instead of being covered in vinyl the armrests can be upholstered in the matching upholstery that you select for the seat and back of the chair. Make sense?

Standard Arms: Armrests move in tandem to eliminate uneven arm positioning and move with a cantilever action that doesn't use buttons or levers. There is a 6” range of vertical adjustment (5-11" above the seat) and they can be positioned below thigh level for close table or desk work. Arms attach to the backrest so they stay in the same relation to your body during recline.

Advanced Arms: Same height adjustment features as standard arms but advanced arms also move laterally to push armrests closer or farther away from your body as well as add an extra 1.25" in depth to the armpad.

Seat Height Adjustment:Standard seat adjusts from 16" - 21" and is appropriate for 95 percent of usersLow seat adjusts from 15.25" - 19.5" and is appropriate for shorter usersTall seat adjusts from 17" - 22.25" and is appropriate for very tall users

Casters and Glides:Standard hard casters are designed for use on carpeted surfaces while soft casters are designed for use on hard floors. The locking casters and glides are safe for any surface and give you the option of a fixed base.

Materials:The graphite and titanium bases are made of hard plastic to match the plastic frame of the chair. The base is also available in polished aluminum.

A foam seat comes with the leather upholstered version of the Freedom Chair.

Armpads are available with Duron covers over foam (Duron is a soft urethane plastic material)or gel. Both Duron and gel armpads are available with or without upholstery to match your seat.

The Freedom Chair is built with dozens of materials, all of which were chosen carefully to keep you comfortable, keep the chair light and easy to move, or to give you options for self-styling. One of the most important materials, which resides in the seat of the chair, is the special gel that makes this particular office chair so comfortable to sit in. This gel allows your body weight to be evenly supported over the whole area of the seat, and that keeps lumps, pressure and undue discomfort out of the equation.

After half an hour of sitting or more, studies have shown the gel seats like the one on the Freedom Chair result in a 60 reduction in max pressure. That's a stunning number in a short period of time (most people sit up to 7 or 8 hours a day at work). Because the gel is more of a liquid than a solid, pressure can be much more evenly and effectively relieved than with a foam or solid seat chair.

Gel is also long lasting, meaning you'll be happy in your chair for a long time. Foam can tear, wear down, and need to be replaced. With our gel seats you won't have that problem.

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Shipping Fee: Free!

Your new Freedom chair will be delivered by FedEx ground to the front door of your home or office building. Each chair ships fully assembled.

Availability:

Each Freedom chair is custom made in the United States. Orders typically ship 3-4 weeks from the date of purchase.

SHOP QUICK-SHIP MODELS

Freedom Chair by HumanscaleLeather Seat and Back, no Headrestdesigned by Niels Diffrient

The Freedom Chair is a product of Humanscale, a company focused on providing ergonomic and person centered office chairs to a world sorely in need. Briefly this chair was on track for diplomatic missions abroad, but it was considered too valuable here at home to ship off. With advanced ergonomic design, an original style, and the most patriotic name in our catalogue, the Freedom Chair is a winner for any office.

What's to Like:

Who doesn't like freedom? The freedom to move around in your chair that is. At work, lots of people need to shift positions with regularity so they can stay comfortable, and the Freedom Chair makes this easy and comfortable. The seat and seat back conspire to even make slouching positions easy on the back and legs.

What's Not to Like:

Not every one gets excited about the style of the chair. The double bar armrest support and the indentations that run down the middle of the seat and seat back appeal to some (Freedom lovers) but not to others (Freedom haters).

Bottom Line:

You can argue about the style, but you can't argue with the comfort. This is a unique and very comfortable desk chair.

It may surprise you to hear that Humanscale doesn't really consider itself to be a furniture company. They make furniture, of course, but rather than calling themselves a furniture company, they call themselves an ergonomics company. There isn't an organization out there more committed, driven, and knowledgable about the field of ergonomics than Humanscale.

Humanscale stands for ergonomic furniture. The Freedom Chair is what you might call their Magnum Opus (thus far).

Designed by Niels Diffrient- a man responsible for major advances in the field of ergonomics in the last few decades- the Freedom Chair is held together by a single idea: that sitting down should be simple and comfortable at the same time. This guiding principle has served Humanscale well, as its ergonomic chairs have become standouts in the design world and the office chair market.

Goodbye Manual AdjustmentsNiels Diffrient errors on the side of simplicity. The Freedom Chair has a self-adjusting Dual Pivot backrest that supports the lumbar area of your back no matter how much you're sitting forward or how much you're reclining. There's no back stop, no tension adjustment. There is a height adjustment on the back of the chair, and once you've set this to fit the lumbar area of your back, you can stop thinking about how to adjust your chair's controls to make it more comfortable.

Revolutionary Counterbalance MechanismThe Freedom Chair was meant to be reclined in. Niels Diffrient once stated that the most ergonomic seating position is to be laying down. Since that's unfortunately not an option at home or in the office, the next best thing is to lean back in your Freedom Chair. Its groundbreaking counterbalance mechanism automatically supplies the optimal amount of recline tension for your body weight and size.

The leather version of the Freedom Chair comes with a standard foam seat. If you want the gel seat, please visit our fabric version.

Also In This Collection

Materials & Measurements

Materials:The graphite and titanium bases are made of hard plastic to match the plastic frame of the chair. The base is also available in polished aluminum.

A foam seat comes with the leather upholstered version of the Freedom Chair.

Armpads are available with Duron covers over foam (Duron is a soft urethane plastic material)or gel. Both Duron and gel armpads are available with or without upholstery to match your seat.

The Freedom Chair is built with dozens of materials, all of which were chosen carefully to keep you comfortable, keep the chair light and easy to move, or to give you options for self-styling. One of the most important materials, which resides in the seat of the chair, is the special gel that makes this particular office chair so comfortable to sit in. This gel allows your body weight to be evenly supported over the whole area of the seat, and that keeps lumps, pressure and undue discomfort out of the equation.

After half an hour of sitting or more, studies have shown the gel seats like the one on the Freedom Chair result in a 60 reduction in max pressure. That's a stunning number in a short period of time (most people sit up to 7 or 8 hours a day at work). Because the gel is more of a liquid than a solid, pressure can be much more evenly and effectively relieved than with a foam or solid seat chair.

Gel is also long lasting, meaning you'll be happy in your chair for a long time. Foam can tear, wear down, and need to be replaced. With our gel seats you won't have that problem.

Your FurnitureGenius Recommendations

Environmental Information

The Freedom Chair is Greenguard Certified and is made of 62 percent recycled materials. It is 90 percent recyclable.

About The Manufacturer

Humanscale's focus since its inception in 1982 has been providing outstanding ergonomic seating and accessories for the home and the office. Their products, which range from task chairs to keyboard trays to CPU holders, are all geared towards making life simpler, easier, and healthier for anyone who works at a desk. Widely recognized for their line of office seating, Humanscale has done much to advance design in some newer product areas- namely in computer and office accessories such as monitor arms, foot machines, and the ergonomic computer mouse. Winner of numerous design awards, Humanscale continues to deliver groundbreaking office tools that combine simplicity, aesthetics, and ergonomics.

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Designer

Niels DiffrientDesigner of the Freedom Chair, the Liberty Chair, and the Diffrient Light, Niels Diffrient is internationally recognized as a premier designer in the field of ergonomics. Diffrient is a world-renowned and world-travelled designer who has worked with some of the greatest aesthetic and ergonomic designers of this or any century. Diffrient was trained at the Cranbrook Academy of Art where he was able to win the First Medal of Design 3 times during his tenure. After graduation he spent time traveling and working in Europe, thanks to a Fulbright Scholarship he had won. Aside from his obvious bonafides in the realm of furniture design, he also has a background in aeronautical engineering.

Diffrient has created many wonderful chairs in his long career. The Freedom Chair is among the most recent, but he was also responsible for the Diffrient Light Chair and the Liberty Chair. Diffrient co-authored the original three part book on modern ergonomic design, title "Humanscale." It was he who helped to lay out clearly and with great aesthetic and scientific insight the way forward for office chairs, and indeed all types of human-centric furniture design.

The Freedom Chair is one of his greatest accomplishments. It combines his love of design with his passion for ergonomics and humanistic art. It's a comfortable, ground-breaking chair built by one of the masters.

With a resume that includes collaboration with icons Eero Saarinen and Marco Zanuso, a background in aeronautical engineering, and numerous design awards, Niels Diffrient is undoubtedly one of the most influential designers of the past 50 years.

Born in 1928 in Star, Mississippi, Diffrient attended Wayne State University and eventually enrolled in the Cranbrook Academy of Art, where he won the First Medal of Design three times during his tenure there. After traveling and working in Europe thanks to a Fulbright Scholarship, Diffrient began work at the design firm Henry Dreyfuss Associates, where he would stay for 25 years. While there, he co-authored the three-volume publication Humanscale. This work summarized his design principles which were rooted in the belief that the human body should drive design for products that humans will interact with. In his own words: "A design should look good and be appealing, but without compromising human factors. Aesthetics should enhance the technical side, not deter from it."

Named the "Granddaddy of the ergonomic revolution by Forbes Magazine in 2007

Honorary Royal Designer for Industry Member- awarded by the Royal Society of Arts and Industry

1996 I.D. Magazine Top 40 Design Innovators

Design Story

There's just something about the Freedom Chair - if you listen closely you can hear the band strike up the national anthem every time you settle into its wide, supremely comfortable, ergonomically sound frame. But it doesn't just feel great - it looks great too. The design leaders at Humanscale have produced a chair with a completely original look and a distinctive flair - it just happens to also be one of the more comfortable office chairs on the market!

This particular version of the Freedom Chair comes complete with a fine leather seat (instead of cloth) handcrafted and perfectly adapted to the body of the chair. You can choose between three different types of leather (depending on your personal taste) including Vicenza, Acqua, and Cervo. Each brings their own distinctive spin to an already fabulous office chair. Each also comes with a different set of color options. When you go with Vicenza leather you can select either a Black, Dark Brown, Night Blue, or Saddle coloring. If Acqua is more your speed, choose from Aquitania, Black Sea, Cote de Azur, Flying Dutchman, Leviathan, and many more. Cervo offers options in Aveto, Campigna, Metaponto, and more. As with other versions of the chair, you also have lots of options when it comes to the type of armrest you want, the finish on the base of the chair, and the kinds of wheels or casters you like best.

No matter which color or style of leather you choose, the chair you receive will be among the finest examples of contemporary office design in our catalogue. Humanscale has always focused on making their products the most ergonomically sound on the market, and the Freedom Chair is one of their crowning achievements.

Design

Humanscale's focus since its inception in 1982 has been providing outstanding ergonomic seating and accessories for the home and the office. Their products, which range from task chairs to keyboard trays to CPU holders, are all geared towards making life simpler, easier, and healthier for anyone who works at a desk. Widely recognized for their line of office seating, Humanscale has done much to advance design in some newer product areas- namely in computer and office accessories such as monitor arms, foot machines, and the ergonomic computer mouse. Winner of numerous design awards, Humanscale continues to deliver groundbreaking office tools that combine simplicity, aesthetics, and ergonomics.

Resources

Shipping & Delivery

Your new Freedom chair will be delivered by FedEx ground to the front door of your home or office building. Each chair ships fully assembled.

Availability:

Each Freedom chair is custom made in the United States. Orders typically ship 3-4 weeks from the date of purchase.

Weight:

Chair without headrest: 35lb

Chair with headrest: 39lb

Warranty

Fabric and cushions come with a 5 year warranty, all other pieces come with a 15 year warranty. To see what kind of value that kind of extensive warranty delivers, see our Freedom Chair Warranty summary.